I have been working on the plan. Here is a little update. Still more work to do.

New Layout Planing

Well normally this time of your with the golf season coming to an end I have lots of time to work on my layout. It will be a little different this winter as the wife and I bought a house so I will have room in the basement for a 12x20 layout. I sold what I had done on the old layout to a friend so I am without a layout for the time being. We take possession of the house at the end of the month and then I will have to finish the basement before bench work can start.

Over the last few weeks I have been playing around with AnyRail planning the new layout. I thought I would post a Pic of what I have so far. Keep in mind that this is just the first draft of the track plan. I will work the track plan so that very little track other than the yard is parallel is the front of the layout. Any Ideas are welcome

My plan is to have staging under the layout and to have a modern double track major main line. Lots of trains that run through and or stop to pick up and drop of in the yard during an ops season. I am planning on having 3-5 major industries that will need pick-ups and drop off's. Paper Mill, oil refinery, auto plant and grain for sure. Train length will be based on 24 coal porters with 2 sd40-2, about 10 feet. I will be using Atlas code 55 with a minimum radius of 18”.

As a Golf Professional I get little time for modeling during the summer months here in Canada. I have been able to do some weathering and I have started to try artist oil paint. With a little practice I am starting to get the hang of the way oils work. The best part of oil is that when I am trying to make rust the texture of the thick oil paint look great. Here are some pic’s of what I have come up with.

I have only put one layer on the well cars. I did them first so now that I know more about how the oils work I will go back over them again and fix them up. I really like that with the oil I can run a little solvent over the oil and it will wash right off until I seal it with dullcote. If anyone is thinking about using oils just remember they take a long time to dry and fingers will take the paint off easy until they are dullcoted. Even after 4 days the oil remains "wet" but after dullcote they become dry once the dullcote sets.

After twisting my ankle on the golf course yesterday I spent today unable to walk and there for had some time to do some modeling.

Today I finished the base of my McDonalds. Vollmer put this kit out almost a year ago and I have been waiting to find time to build it. I have the restaurant itself built but I still need to do some detail work. I need to find a place on the layout for it so I can build the drive through, as well as make an out door eating area. I am planning on lighting this building so there are some people in line waiting to place an order. I also need to find more sitting people so they can be eating.  

I haven’t had a lot of time to work on the layout but I have started to do some ballast.

I started with painting the track with a mix of Burnt Umber and Burnt Sienna.

After the track was painted I used half light gray and half gray with just a touch of cinders to ballast the track.

After the ballast dried I painted the center of the track to make it dirty and well used. I used a tarnished black wash through out the center of the track. Then a light rust wash on the nail heads of the track. Then I used a eye dropper with a black wash down the middle of the track to look like oil streaks.

River update and Custom Painting

I haven’t done a lot of work on the layout as of late but I though I would post some new photos. I have added some trees to my river bank and have added a neon sign to my hotel.

I still need to flock some of the trees but I just noticed I only have one colour of grown cover mixed to I will need to get more.

The sign needs to be raised up a little.

I have also had some time to do some painting. Here are some photos of some new stuff.

the start of a river.

I have started to work on some scenery. On the inside of the U part of my layout I am going to have a river, well it is more of a river bank with just a little water here and there as it winds along the track.

This was easy for me to do because I have a layer of 1½ “ foam on top of my bench work so all I needed to do was cut the corner of the foam off making it easy to contour. After a layer of plaster cloth I applied a layer of plaster to make sure the foam would not come in contact with the woodlands realistic water causing it to bubble.

 After a coating of Woodland slate gray paint I started to apply talus rock in fine and medium gray. To do this on the slop I painted a layer of white glue to hole the talus rock in place. After the glue dried, over night I put a layer of white glue and water mixed over the talus rock to seal it.

I also started to weather and ballast a small section of track. I Started by air brushing everything with rail tie brown. Then I painted some odd ties with a lighter colour of brown to make them look older. After I had the track painted the way I wanted it I added the ballast and used a stiff paint brush to move it around so it looked just as I wanted it. With an eye dropper I put 70% alcohol in between the rails. Once the middle of the track was wet I added the same glue mix. When you add the glue mix in between the rails after the alcohol it flows easy. It also pushes the alcohol out the sides covering all the ballast. I find that if you use to much alcohol it just get pushed out the sides by the glue and makes the surrounding all wet.

After the ballast dried, over night again, I added some fine ground cover to make it look like dead and alive grass. I don’t know if I like the way it looks but we can always pick it off with a knife.